Those wacky Sweet Potato Queens: They 'can can' and they 'will will'

When Contessa Vanessa of St. Augustine begins to discuss the worldwide Sweet Potato Queens organization, she puts her mouth on fast forward.

Her words spew forth with such speed that it's impossible for a mere mortal, pen in hand, to keep up with her rapid-fire monologue on the virtues of this organization.

And to think it all began for Vanessa Fairbairn because, when she was looking for a birthday present, she spied a book which she thought contained recipes for sweet potatoes. Both she and the friend for whom the book was intended are great sweet potato lovers.

The book was titled "Sweet Potato Queens' Book of Love."

"The cover jumped out at me," Fairbairn admits, and "I bought it."

Upon reading it, she didn't want to part with the publication. What she'd found was a parody on beauty queens and Southern Belles and an introduction to a group which is just "a lot of fun."

It's all about "women getting together to do things because they can."

It's more outlandish than the Red Hat Society, Fairbairn continues, trying to describe just what Sweet Potato Queens are. The Red Hat Society is composed of women over 50 who wear red hats and purple dresses - or, if you're under 50, pink hats and lilac dresses, and, like the Sweet Potato Queens, get together to have fun - but not quite to the extent as the Sweet Potato Queens, says Fairbairn.

Fairbairn is part of the St. Augustine Can Can Queens, Sweet Potato Wanna Be's, she says. It's a chapter of the Sweet Potato Queen movement, and, like all the other chapters, members get together to have good, clean fun.

Last summer, for instance, a Cabana Boys recruiting party was held here. These are men whose major goal in life must be to fetch and tote for the queens.

Spotlighted recently in a variety of major publications, Browne, 50, was described in an article in the March 24 People magazine as a woman "whose shtick as the smart-mouthed sovereign of a band of tacky acolytes has landed her a $1 million advance for her next two books."

The Sweet Potato Queens had their beginnings 21 years ago when Browne and friends, participating in the first St. Patrick's Day Parade in Jackson, "put on thrift-store prom dresses and tossed raw yams to the crowd," the People magazine explains.

There are more than 2,000 chapters of Sweet Potato Queens around the world, and each year, they flock to Jackson for the big St. Patrick's Day event.

Contessa Vanessa attended her third celebration this March.

She made reservations for the first event immediately after reading Browne's book, and she and the friend for whom she'd purchased the book had a wonderful time.

Fairbairn also checked out the Sweet Potato Queen Web site - www.sweetpotato-queens.com - and its message board, where she met a woman who is now "my best friend." For the past two years, the two have been among the faithful in Jackson on St. Patrick's Day.

Sweet Potato Queens is "all about friendship," really, says Fairbairn. "It's just a play group. It's not men bashing" or anything.

But, it's also about "empowering women." It's about "be who you are and have a good time."

Women from around the nation agree.

In an interview with a Miami Herald reporter, an Allen, Texas, woman, Mary Breaux - aka Queen Lulu - described the group as "outrageous, and everything's OK with everybody."

Another woman from Jackson told the Herald reporter: "We are the middle-aged woman's equivalent of 'Rocky Horror Picture Show.' "